An Unexpected Miracle: Making Adoption a Reality

In June 2000, Sandi Serkess wanted to adopt a child. Even though she wanted an older boy of any race or religion, she found very few who met her needs. She went to adoption parties, looked on the web, and checked with the Massachusetts Adoption Resource Exchange (MARE). As time passed, she worrie...

In June 2000, Sandi Serkess wanted to adopt a child. Even though she wanted an older boy of any race or religion, she found very few who met her needs. She went to adoption parties, looked on the web, and checked with the Massachusetts Adoption Resource Exchange (MARE). As time passed, she worried that even when she found a child, it would still be six months before he could live with her and then another six months before the adoption became final. If it didn’t work out, she would have to start again.

The week before Thanksgiving, Sandi spoke with her next-door neighbor. She had adopted privately and advised Sandi to look into it. Sandi called JF&CS where her father had been an adoption worker in the fifties. In talking with Judy, a JF&CS adoption employee, Sandi realized that private adoption was prohibitively expensive. “Come talk to me anyway,” Judy insisted. Sandi agreed when she learned that Judy’s mother had actually worked with her father decades earlier at JF&CS and that was why she was being so persistent.